Hiligaynon

Hiligaynon, also known as Ilonggo, belongs to the Bisayan group of the Austronesian language family. According to Ethnologue, there are 5,770,000 speakers of the language who live primarily on the island of Panay in the Philippines. Hiligaynon’s closest relatives are Capiznon, Masbatenyo, and Porohanon. Hiligaynon is the fourth largest of the 175 languages spoken in the Philippines.

Status

Hiligaynon has no official status in the Philippines. However, it is used as a language of wider communication in the areas where it is spoken. Many speakers of Hiligaynon also speak Filipino and/or English.

Dialects

Structure

Like all Austronesian languages, Hiligaynon has a relatively simple sound system with no consonant clusters. All words are formed from syllables containing Consonant + Vowel + (optional Consonant). There are no consonant clusters.

Vowels
Hiligaynon has five vowel phonemes, i.e., sounds that distinguish the meaning of words. In addition, there are several diphthongs. The vowel phonemes are given below.

Stress normally falls on the ultimate or penultimate (next-to-last) syllable of roots.

If stress falls on the penultimate syllable ending in a vowel, the vowel is lengthened, e.g., á:mo. If stress falls on the final syllable ending in a vowel, that vowel is louder and the penultimate vowel is short.

Functional relations within a sentence are marked by voice affixes that agree with the grammatical role of the noun in the topic (nominative case) plus optional oblique and/or locative cases.

Nouns
There are two classes of nouns: common and proper.

Common nouns are marked by the suffix –ang.

Proper nouns are marked by the suffix -si.

Common nouns have three cases:
-Topic, similar to the nominative case.
–Oblique case used after verbs and prepositions.
– Locative case.

Plurality is marked by the suffix –mga.

Proper nouns are also marked for the three cases and for plurality.

Adjectives
Adjectives and nouns are linked by juxtaposition or by the particle –nga/-ng, e.g., mahatúm nga babáyi ‘beautiful woman’.

Pronouns

Pronouns have three persons: first, second, and third.

There is an inclusive and exclusive first person plural ‘we’ and a singular and plural form for third person ‘you’.

Demonstratives
There are three ways of indicating proximity: near me, near you, and far away. They have different forms in the absolutive and oblique cases. They have different forms in the absolutive and oblique cases.

Numerals
There are two sets of numerals: native and those borrowed from Spanish. The latter are used when dealing with money, dates, time and with compound numerals. Native numbers (given below) are used when counting in a series.

Negation
There are several negative markers with different functions.

Verb
The verb system of Hiligaynon is fairly complex. Verbs are marked for the following categories:

As a result of prolonged contact Hiligaynon has many loanwords fromSpanish, English, and neighboring Filipino languages such as Tagalog and Cebuano. Most loanwords were assimilated into the sound system of Hiligaynon.

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